Housing Stability for Youth

Preventing young people from experiencing the trauma of homelessness is one of the key priorities of the Raikes Foundation. When young people have access to safe, stable housing, they are more likely to succeed in school, experience better health outcomes, and be financially independent. In Washington State, the Raikes Foundation partners with young people, non-profit organizations, and public agencies to implement homelessness prevention systems to ensure young people remain stably housed and make sure those who transition from the foster care, legal, and behavioral health systems are connected to safe housing options. We’ve had tremendous success: we supported the creation of prevention action plans at the state level, the implementation of effective interventions at the county level, and now have data showing a reduction in young people exiting systems into homelessness.

• Schools are key partners in our efforts to prevent and end youth homelessness. We know that students who do not graduate high school are 4.5 times as likely to experience homelessness than their peers who graduate, and that half of adults experiencing homelessness experienced it first as a young person. By engaging schools, our partners not only help students keep and find safe, stable housing options, but also support them in graduating, reducing their probability of experiencing homelessness in adulthood. The Raikes Foundation invests in strategies that connect schools and housing options, like the Building Changes education program in Washington state, which has seen a dramatic rise in the graduation rate of students experiencing homelessness. We also support Education Leads Home, a national campaign focused on improving educational outcomes for children and youth who experience homelessness.

Every year, more than four million young people experience homelessness in the U.S., 700,000 of them are adolescents under 18 years of age. By increasing coordination efforts between schools, child welfare agencies, and health and legal systems, we can ensure every community has a developmentally and culturally appropriate rapid response system focused on helping young people at risk of experiencing homelessness. We work with partners like Community Solutions and A Way Home Washington to ensure communities have the data necessary to quickly match young people’s needs with housing options.

Preventing and ending youth homelessness will only be possible if young people are involved in shaping the policy decisions that directly impact their lives. The Raikes Foundation partners with youth advocacy groups and community coalitions to educate policymakers on issues most pressing to young people experiencing homelessness and collaborates with government entities to ensure funding decisions incorporate a diverse set of perspectives centering Black and indigenous people of color as well as youth who identify as LGBTQ+. We created the Housing Our People Equitably (HOPE) Initiative to learn from young people with lived experience of homelessness and partner with them in grantmaking and leadership development opportunities.